Dreamcast convenience of service mods

Well it is about time I got another Dreamcast seeing as my others + BBA ended up in the bin and I have Geist etc to hopefully look forwards to playing.

It will be my first time ever modding or having a modded DC in 11 or so years though (believe it or not!)

I've dug out a fully wired RGB SCART cable, a VGA box and 56k modem from my parts bin so they are a non-issue.

I'm looking at doing the following mods at present:

1. Swop the Orange to Blue LED (easy)
2. Swop the onboard battery for a proper CR2032 back box for solderless battery replacement, maybe mounted in the well under the disc lid, maybe not. (easy)
3. Swop out the controller port resistor for mounts to throw in resistors without further soldering ie ports blow rip it out and throw another in without getting out the iron again. (easy)
4. Swop out or piggyback the BIOS for a ROM mount to flash and drop out others as and when required. (Probably need help here)
5. Swop out the PSU for laptop battery + external PSU (definitely need help here)

The laptop battery + transformer is not so much to make the system portable or anything. It is partly due to we have a pauper's pay as you go electric meter and mum often forgets to top it up at the worst possible gaming moments, partly because it isn't very practical to run it from an uninterruptable power supply due to space/size/weight/cost concerns, partly due to new metrolink construction or shitty service with the usual occasional blackouts, partly because the DC has standardish PC 3.3/5/12v rails, partly because it may help the DC run a little cooler but mostly just because it can be done so why not?

I want to try keep the DC looking as stock as possible so it can still function with the original peripherals without looking like a sack of shit.

As I'm clumsy my cousin who is a qualified electronics engineer will be doing most of the work when he has time away from his day job, missus and son which isn't often. Sufficient motivation will be provided to him via cattle prod if necessary

I'm pretty sure people would have tried many of these projects individually. I've read of someone attempting a laptop battery UPS system in 2002 but as far as I know they never completed it. If anyone has links to guides or resarch along the lines to save my cousin some time on 4 & 5 it would be appreciated.

 

4) Guide available at swat.ru. It's all in Russian, but fairly easy to understand anyway. There's a link at the bottom to the required chips on ebay.fr.

http://www.dc-swat.ru/blog/hardware/16.html

5) I would say it's a lot easier than step 4. All that's really required is a Pico PSU, rechargeable batteries and an external power brick. I'm considering doing the same to mine - but minus the batteries - in order to free up some space inside the system for additional mods. There should be pinouts available on the benheck.com forums, as they're commonly used as a space-saving measure on Dreamcast portable mods. It's not the cheapest of mods though. Or you could move out.

 

It's actually a fuse. 390mA picofuse

 

Yup. You could probably replace it with a resettable fuse, which resets back to normal when the device is switched off.

 

A "fusible resistor" to be 100% correct...

http://www.dcemu.co.uk/vbulletin/threads/116732-Sega-Dreamcast-controller-port-repair

 

Cheers for the links. I was going to stay at my cousins this weekend as I'm home alone for a bit now, but I have to stay in to receive my 5 Dreamcast job lot + BBA packages =/ If they arrive I'll see f I can get hm off his arse to come here, if not, I'll be seeing him next weekend.

 

This is actually a .39A fuse, Picofuses use the same color codes as resistors with an extra band at the end. This one is marked orange-white-silver-silver-green i.e. 0.39 and fast/slow blow spec.

I couldn't find any 390mA pico fuses but you could replace it with a 3/8 Amp or 1/2 Amp fuse from the Electronics Goldmine.

 

Ran across this thread searching for a solution to dead controller ports, anyone have more information about the resetting fusible resistor method?

 

Pay as you go electricity!?
Damn